Sure, it's Bioware's baby. Their game, their creation. And while they did such a great job with ME and ME2 to give the player the feeling that the player was in control, the truth is that all three games, we're just guiding the characters through Bioware's story. The details of the story are shaped by us...but it's not a sandbox series, and it never has been. It's more of a choose your own adventure...there are many paths, and many of them lead to Critical Mission Failure. But in the end, you can only go so far...and that ending is and has been what Bioware made it to be.
ME2 set a very high precedent. The ending really only had 2 big variable...destroy the base, or keep it. But getting there, the journey...those impacts were made by your choices along the way. Failing to make certain choices resulted in members of your crew getting killed. You could even succeed in the mission, but have Shepherd die. Me 2 ended with a real feeling that the player mattered. More, that what the player did throughout the game mattered.
ME3 fails for me and many others because it fails to live up to the expectations created by ME2. Worse, it fails to remain true to the artistic creation that Bioware has crafted across three games. Bioware's defense of artistic vision and integrity rings false to most true fans because we realize just how much the ending diverges from the rest of the series. ME3's ending WOULD be a triumph of artistic creation...in some other game. In some game that wasn't built upon doing the impossible, beating the unbeatable, and surviving the suicide mission. In some game that didn't embrace diversity and teamwork, and focus on them as the key to success.
ME3 fails to maintain the creative integrity established by the earlier entries in the series. Bioware wants us to let them be free to express themselves as they wish...even if that expression clashes with the story that they have worked so hard to create. And when we call them on their own error, they get defensive and huffy.
And it is an error. There's nothing clever or edgy or artistic in creating and ending that does nothing but unravel hundreds of hours of story. Imagine a masterwork painting, and right smack dab in the middle is a swatch of color that would fit in another painting, but just clashes with everything around it. And in ME3's case, that out of place image isn't even all that well made.
There's a place for art like this, and an audience. But it's a much smaller audience, and it's one that is more interested in the outlandish than the entertaining.
Bioware has lost me through all of this. I pre-ordered all three titles, and up until yesterday was willing to buy Me3 back after retuning it, when the price came down. Now, I don't even see the point of that. The ending will always feel like it doesn't belong. It will always leave me feeling like there's something missing, that this can't end this way. And adding an explanation won't help. There isn't enoug logic in the galaxy that can make that ending fit onto the grand epic that was Mass Effect.
Here's the flaw with Artistic Integrity
Débuté par
Alerithon
, avril 07 2012 07:53
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